The ability to prove one’s identity is essential to securing a number of life-enhancing services such as healthcare, education, financial services, connectivity and social protections. However, at least 1.5 billion people still lack an official form of identification and in many countries, this problem disproportionately affects the most vulnerable segments of society such as the poor, individuals fleeing persecution or conflict, women and children Our report shows that by helping to design mobile applications that address fundamental barriers to birth registration – particularly process efficiency, accessibility and affordability – the mobile operators helped to achieve significant, measurable impact in a relatively short amount of time. In Tanzania, Tigo saw registration rates in the target areas rise from 8.9 per cent to 30.3 per cent in just six months. Across all three of Telenor Pakistan’s pilot locations, almost three times as many children were registered between June and December 2015, as compared to the same time period in the previous year.